Australianisms

arvo  ->  afternoon
bathers  ->  swimsuits
Bogans  ->  Australian hicks
bush tucker  ->  food from the bush (edible plants, etc.)
Chemist  ->  Pharmacist
chips  ->  fries (but potato chips are also chips)
crack on  ->  come onto, hit on
cuppa  ->  cup of tea
Esky  ->  travel cooler
fairy floss  ->  cotton candy
footy  ->  Australian Rules Football League (AFL)
fringe  ->  bangs (hair)gas  ->  propanegoon  ->  terrible cheap wine in a 1-2L box
heaps  ->  lots
hotel  ->  pub
How you going?  ->  How are you doing?
I reckon...  ->  I believe/think/feel...
ice block  ->  popsicle
jug  ->  pitcher
keen  ->  eager
kindie  ->  kindergarten
lollies  ->  candies
Macca's  ->  McD's
mate  ->  friend (everyone knows this, but yes, it is actually used all the time)
mozzie  ->  mosquito
op shop  ->  thrift shop/second-hand store
petrol  ->  gas
push bike  ->  bicycle
rock up  ->  show up, arrive
school  ->  high school
She'll be right  ->  It'll be alright
singlet  ->  tanktop, sleevless cotton undershirt (similar to a wifebeater, but not necessarily 
ribbed)
slab  ->  a two-four of beer/cider/etc.
sunnies  ->  sunglasses
surf life saver  ->  lifeguard
swag  ->  rolled up bedding, usually a foam mattress, sleeping bag, and pillow, in a single 
person canvas tent/bag for camping, though also extensively used as a spare bed when 
staying over at a friend's

tea  ->  dinner

thongs  ->  flip flops
torch  ->  flashlight
tomato sauce  ->  ketchup
uni  ->  university
Ute (you-te)  ->  Utility vehicle, pickup truck
yiros  ->  shawarma
your/my shout  ->  your/my treat, turn to buy

Update

Rode a motorbike for the first time yesterday. It was awesome.

Update

My camera is dead. The sand has claimed it. It is very sad.

A Tea Party Video

Compliments of film genius Cameron Roberts, I give you "A Tea Party".





Original blog post about the Tea Party can be found here.


*Confession: I love this video to bits. I've watched it so many times and every time I break out in this ridiculous smile. This was such an awesome day. I should just pack all these guys up and bring them back to Canada to film my life.

Dinner and a Movie

Here's to another ridiculously long weekend.


To start off, the Clipsal races ran from Thursday to Sunday. Basically it's this whole slew of car races where several city streets are shut down. All the bogans (Aussie hicks) come out of the woodworks, and there is this incessant buzzing that can be heard throughout the CBD. At first it was intriguing, and the sound of the cars driving around the track was exciting, but after the first day, I was already getting sick of it.

Before I get in to all the events of this past weekend, let me just say that I have now been out 4 nights in a row. Once again I am exhausted. And naps have been my best friend lately. 


Thursday I was invited out to see a show at the Adelaide Fringe Festival. I hadn't been there yet, so I was quite excited. We went to The Garden of Unearthly Delights, about a 10 minute walk from my apartment. The garden is free to get into, but show tickets and food/drinks are extra. It is basically set up like a really quirky midway/circus. There are circus tents and salons as show venues, as well as a ferris wheel, and a double decker cocktail bus, where we spent a lot of time talking to the friendly bartender. We bought tickets to Sammy J & Randy which was hilarious, and really well done. I noticed there was an act called 3 Canadians, so I'll have to check that out sometime while I'm here as well. 
After the show we met up with Ali and Heather who had happened to find themselves with a Clipsal sponsorship team. So after a few drinks we headed home for the night. 


Friday was the date of our much anticipated Canadian dinner. We wanted to thank all the shack people for making us feel so welcome, so we invited them all over for some Canadian eats. Clearly poutine was a must. We couldn't find any cheese curds in the grocery, so regular cheese had to suffice. We weren't very surprised when nobody knew what poutine was, but we couldn't believe that no one had heard of perogies before. They may not be Canadian, but they are definitely readily available there. Perogies were then added to the dinner menu, but you can't get them here, so Ali had to use her grandmother's recipe and make them all by hand. We realized that most foods you associate with Canada are basically all consisting of starch, so we also threw in some baked veggies to round it out. 


We did the tacky thing and dressing in red and white, threw some of our photos from back home into a slide show (Tim Horton's was featured excessively), and made up a playlist of Canadian artists. Everyone loved the food, and then we introduced them to a few Canadian drinking games (Beer pong, Flip cup, Zumi zumi). Aisha ushered us all into some going out clothes and off we went to find some good music to dance off the rest of the night.
In the morning we made a typical Canadian breakfast for those who stayed over consisting of pancakes, sausages, scrambled eggs, and buttery cinnamon sugar apples all completely drowned in syrup.

Saturday the there was an outdoor cinema set up at the shack. They hired a projector and set up a whole screening area to show friends and family some of the short videos they've put together. What those guys have managed to do is pretty incredible. Afterwards we all hung out at the shack and us Canadians thought it was about time we taught the Australians Slap Jack. I believe it was well received.

Sweet setup

Speeches to start off the night

No one can resist a good game of Slap Jack

Sunday was supposed to be a relaxing day so I re-dyed my hair (it's gone bleach blond in about a month), and had a nap. I was then invited out to the Adelaide Festival at Barrio. I was still pretty awake from my nap, so I headed out. Barrio was pretty cool. They took over an open area with a big sculpture and lots of concrete pillars that are the perfect height for tables or chairs. The entrance was the word BARRIO entirely lit up. You had to walk through one of the R's to get in. The event was free but you had to give an offering to Barrio to gain entrance. I wasn't aware of that, so they gave me a little disco ball to offer up. Inside they had divided the whole area up into sections so that it was almost maze-like. There were several bars all with different themes (desert, ski lodge, candy bar, etc.), a band set-up, a free tropical fruit stand, a dj, some guy setting up a rube-golberg machine, and some free arcade games. The whole thing was pretty cool but unfortunately there wasn't enough light for me to get any good pictures.

Entrance at Barrio

Our relaxing day was pushed back to Monday. Class in the morning, and dinner and sunset watching at Glenelg Beach in the evening. I needed that.

School: Week 1

We've just concluded our first week of school here in Australia. My week started on Tuesday with Ceramic Production Techniques and Textiles: Print & Dye. I was originally signed up for a glass forming class, but that was unfortunately cancelled, so they put me into ceramics.


Now, when I was in high school, I was definitely into all the artsy stuff, and I thought that these sort of crafts courses would be fun, plus we don't exactly offer them back at Carleton. Typically, the first classes of any course will be highly boring, as we all know, since everyone has to read out all that legislative stuff. These classes however were particularly painful. It made me realize that ID has made me take a more practical approach to a lot of things, because these classes just felt like fluff. 


I don't exactly want to bash these courses, since these things can be fun on their own time, but it's not something that I really want to be studying in university. So far I've dropped the textiles class. I was more opposed to waiting for cloth to dye for hours than I was to actually making things with my hands. I still have the ceramics class for now, but I should be getting into a furniture for manufacture class with the help of my studio prof. With this at least I'll get a chance to go work in the workshops.


Studio class was a completely different story. Our prof seems really engaging and the project he presented to us seemed challenging. We were supposed to design something to help nurses with the process of dry wound dressing (when they change and clean up bandages). This was set up much like the toy design project I did last semester at Carleton, where it spans the entire semester from research done through site visits and nurse interviews, to the final concept and presentation. 


Friday was the day we were supposed to go visit the hospital. That never happened. Unfortunately there were too many barriers involved with us visiting even the staged, educational wing of the hospital as it was reserved for studying nurses. The school is going to try again to run this project next year, but in the meantime, this year they've decided to run two projects in parallel.


From what I understand, these projects will be separate, but we'll be working on both during the semester. Since we have two studio periods each week, one day will be dedicated to the first project and the other day will be dedicated to the second project.


Only one project has been introduced so far. We'll be redesigning a mobile projection unit. Basically it's a self contained laptop/projector/sound station that lecturers can use for their classes. The current one looks like a mobile metal box until it's unlocked, and pre-fab parts line the inside with cables everywhere. Its nickname: the dalek. Our job is to turn it into an R2D2.


(Pictures of studio to come)

Update

The Australians have officially dubbed the apartment "Canada".